When Zyun Reeves was a freshman at East Forsyth High School in Kernersville, N.C., he was a 6-3, 160-pounder that did not play very much on the football. Thus he decided as a sophomore he would focus on basketball instead.

“Sometimes, something has to go away before you decide how much you really love it,” East Forsyth head coach Todd Willert said. “He’s kind of blessed that he took that year off to focus on basketball. He found that he missed the game of football.”

During that sophomore basketball season, Reeves approached Willert about potentially getting back into football. In the midst of a growth spurt that would carry Reeves to be 6-foot-7, 265 pounds in the current day, Willert was not about to turn him away.

Willert asked Reeves to finish out the basketball and join football workouts.

“He came every morning from that day on to lift weights and work out with the football guys and then went to basketball in the afternoon, and that’s when I knew he was totally committed,” Willert recalled. “We had spring ball that following spring he didn’t miss one workout, not one spring practice.”

One of the benefits of being at a state powerhouse program like East Forsyth, winners of the 2018 and 2019 4-A state titles, is you will get noticed by colleges. It was not long before recruiters were asking Willert about the physically imposing Reeves.